The Fifth Gospel

The Fifth Gospel: Lecture IV

Schmidt Number: S-2823

On-line since: 30th November, 2007

byRudolf Steiner

Lecture
IVOslo, NorwayOctober 5, 1913

What
is written at the end of the Gospel of John is a relief
for me when I speak about the Fifth Gospel today. We
remember at the end it states that in no way is everything
that Christ Jesus did told, for if one wanted to tell of
all the events there wouldn't be enough books in the
world to contain them. So it cannot be doubted that in
addition to what is described in books, much more can have
occurred.

I would like
to tell you about Jesus of Nazareth from the time he was
twelve years old. As you know, it was the time when the I
of Zarathustra, which was incarnated in one of the two
Jesus children transferred, be means of a mystical act,
into the other Jesus child, into the Jesus child described
at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke. [See Note 1] So we will
begin with the year in Jesus of Nazareth's life when
the Jesus of the Luke Gospel received Zarathustra´s I.
We know that the Gospel of Luke describes the moment when
Jesus is said to have been lost and he is found again
sitting with the scribes and how all were so astonished by
the powerful answers he gave. We know, however, that these
meaningful, powerful answers came from the fact that the
spiritually veiled memory of the I of Zarathustra acted in
a way to enable Jesus to give such surprising answers. We
also know that due to the mother's death in one of
the families and the father's death in the other,
both families joined together and the Jesus boy who bore
Zarathustra's I grew up in that unified family.

According to
the Fifth Gospel it was a very special growing up period.
At first his immediate neighbors had a most favorable
opinion of him because of the surprising answers he gave in
the temple. They saw the potential scholar (scribe) in him,
one who could reach a high level of scholarship. They had
great hopes for him and hung on his words. Nevertheless, he
became ever more silent – so much so that they became
ill-disposed to him. He, however, was engaged in an inner
struggle, a mighty struggle in himself between his twelfth
and eighteenth years. In his soul there was something like
a rising up of the treasures of wisdom, as if the sum of
the former Zarathustra-knowledge was rising in the form of
Jewish scholarship.

At first the
boy listened attentively to everything the many
scribes/scholars said who came to his home in Nazareth, and
was able to give exceptional answers. In the beginning he
astonished those scribes who looked upon him as a
wunderkind. But then he became more and more silent and
listened without speaking to what the others said. At the
same time great ideas, meaningful moral impulses arose in
his soul. What he heard from the scribes at that time made
an impression on him, but it was an impression which often
left a trace of bitterness in his soul, because he had the
feeling – already in those young years, mind you
– that there was much uncertainty, things that could
lead to error in what the scribes spoke based on the old
tradition, from the old scriptures which are collected in
the Old Testament. It was always depressing when he heard
that in ancient times the spirit came over the prophets,
that God himself had spoken to the old prophets and that
now inspiration had abandoned the succeeding generations.
But he paid special attention to one thing, because he felt
that it would happen to him.

“Yes,
that great spirit, that powerful spirit which came to
Elias, for example, no longer speaks.” What did still
speak, however, which many believed to be an inspiration
from the spiritual heights, what still spoke was a weaker
voice which some believed to hear as coming from the spirit
of Jahveh himself. “Bath Kol” was the name
given to that inspiring voice, although a weaker, lesser
voice than that which inspired the ancient prophets, but
nevertheless something similar. Some in Jesus'
surroundings spoke thus of Bath Kol. Later Jewish
scriptures also tell of this Bath-Kol. [See Note 2]

Now I will
insert something into this Fifth Gospel which doesn't
really belong, but will help to explain Bath Kol. Later on
there was a conflict in two rabbinical schools, because the
famous Rabbi Elieser ben Hirkano formulated a teaching and
as proof of the teaching – the Talmud also describes
this – he claimed that he could work miracles. He had
a Carob tree rise from the earth and replant itself a
couple of hundred feet away; he made a stream flow
backwards, and as the third miracle he invoked a
“voice from heaven” that his teaching would be
made manifest. But this was not believed in the opposing
rabbinical school of Rabbi Josia, who replied:
“However much Rabbi Elieser has carob trees
transplant themselves from one place to another, however
much he makes streams flow upwards, or invoke Bath Kol
– it is written in the Law that the eternal laws of
being must be lain in the mouths of men and in the hearts
of men. And if he wants to convince us, this Rabbi Elieser,
he should not invoke Bath Kol, but he should invoke what
human hearts can apprehend.”

I tell this
story because we can see from it that soon after the
introduction of Christianity Bath Kol was still held in a
somewhat lesser esteem in certain rabbinical schools. But
she [Bath=daughter; Kol=voice – ed.] had bloomed as
an inspiring voice amongst rabbis and scribes.

While the
young Jesus heard and felt all that, he was receiving
inspiration through Bath Kol. What was remarkable was that
by means of fecundation of his soul with the I of
Zarathustra, Jesus was in fact capable of assimilating what
the others around him knew. Not only that he could give the
scribes such strong answers in his twelfth year, but he
could also hear the Bath Kol in his own heart. But it was
just the fact of this inspiration through Bath Kol that
caused him to experience bitter inner struggles when he was
sixteen, seventeen years old. For the Bath Kol revealed to
him – and he believed it to be true – that in
the continuation of the stream of the Old Testament, the
same spirit which had spoken to the Jewish teachers of long
ago would no longer do so. One day – and it was
terrible for his soul – he believed that Bath Kol
revealed to him the following: I no longer reach to the
heights where the spirit can reveal to me the truth about
the future of the Jewish people. It was a terrible moment
when the Bath Kol seemed to reveal that she could not
continue the old revelations, that she was incapable of
continuing to inspire the old Judaism. Jesus of Nazareth
felt the ground under his feet swept away, and many times
he said to himself: All the soul powers with which I
thought myself to possess only allow me to understand that
in the evolutionary substance of Judaism no capacity
remains to ascend to the revelations of the spirit of
God.

Imagine
ourselves for a moment in the soul of Jesus of Nazareth
when such he experienced this. It was at the same time
– in his sixteenth, seventeenth, eighteenth years
– when he traveled, partly because of his trade,
partly for other reasons. On those travels he got to know
various regions of Palestine, and probably various places
outside Palestine. At that time an Asiatic cult was
propagated over the Middle East, and even in Europe, an
Asiatic cult which was a mixture of many other cults, but
which was mainly the Mithras cult – one can see this
clearly when one clairvoyantly absorbs the Akasha Record.
In many places in various regions temples for the Mithras
rituals existed. In many places it was similar to the Attis
ritual, but it was essentially the Mithras ritual. In a
certain sense it was ancient paganism, but penetrated by
the Mithan or Attis ceremonies. An example of the extent to
which it spread is the fact that St. Peter's
Cathedral in Rome stands on the same spot where a Mithras
cult was previously celebrated. Yes, one must say what for
many Roman Catholics will seem blasphemous: that the rituals
of St. Peter's cathedral and everything which derives
from them is in its outer form not unlike the old Attis
ritual, on whose site St. Peter's stands.

Jesus of
Nazareth learned about what was done in those sites when he
began traveling around during his sixteenth, seventeenth,
eighteenth years. And he continued doing so later. He
learned to know the souls of the pagans through physical,
outer observation. Because of the incorporation of the I of
Zarathustra into his soul the capacity to do this developed
in a natural way, something that others could only attain
with great effort: clairvoyant power. He experienced in
those pagan religious rituals something which others did
not – shocking things. It may sound fantastic, but I
must emphasize that when Jesus was present at certain pagan
rituals as the priests carried out the ceremonies at the
altars, he saw that demonic beings were attracted to them.
He also discovered that many idols which they prayed to
were not images of good spiritual beings, but of demonic
powers. Yes, he also discovered that the demonic powers
often merged with the faithful who were attending the
services. It is not difficult to understand why these
things are not described in the other gospels. And it is
only now possible to speak about them in the confines of
our spiritual movement, for human souls can only now, in
our times, understand the enormously profound experiences
which played out in the young Jesus of Nazareth.

His
wandering continued into his twentieth, twenty-second,
twenty-fourth years. He always felt bitterness in his soul
when he saw the force of demons spawned by Lucifer and
Ahriman and how paganism had gone so far as to take the
demons for gods, even to depict wild demonic powers in
idols, and the powers were attracted by these images and
rituals and merged with the praying people, possessed them.
They were bitter experiences, and they came to a climax
when he was about twenty-four years old.

It was a
new, difficult experience added to the Bath Kol
disappointment. I must say that at this time I am not able
to indicate at which place in his travels this experience
took place, although it was possible for me to decipher the
scene correctly to a large extent. Only the place is still
unknown to me. It seems to me that the scene took place
outside Palestine. Although I cannot say that with
certainty, I must describe the scene.

In his
twenty-fourth year Jesus of Nazareth came to a place where
sacrifices were being made to a certain god at a pagan
place of worship. Around it, however, were sad people
affected by all kinds of terrible mental and physical
illnesses. The place of worship had long since been
abandoned by the priests. And Jesus heard the people
wailing: “The priests have abandoned us and the
blessings of the sacrifice do not come to us and we are
leprous and sick because the priests have abandoned
us.” Those people cried out to Jesus. Infinite love
for these aggrieved people flared up in his soul. The
people must have noticed something of this infinite love;
it must have made a profound impression on those lamenting
people who had been abandoned by their priests and, as they
believed, by their gods. And then arose, instantaneously,
in the hearts of most of them who saw the expression of
infinite love on Jesus' face, the need to say:
“You are the new priest sent to us.” They
pushed him to the altar, they placed him at the pagan
altar. He stood there and they demanded of him that he
perform the offering in order that they receive the
gods' blessings. While that happened, while they were
pushing him to the altar, he fell down like dead, his soul
left him and the people around him who thought their god
was to come back saw that the one they took to be the new
priest sent from heaven fell down as if dead. But Jesus of
Nazareth's soul felt itself carried up to a spiritual
height, to the realm of the sun. And now he heard, as if
coming from the realm of the sun, words which he had
previously often heard through Bath Kol. But now Bath Kol
was transformed, had become something completely different.
The voice also came from a different direction, and what
Jesus of Nazareth heard, translated into our language, may
be summarized by the words I was first able to pronounce
when we recently laid the foundation stone of our building
in Dornach. [See Note 3]

Occult
obligations exist! And following one such occult obligation
I disclosed what Jesus of Nazareth heard from the
transformed voice of Bath Kol. He heard the words:

AUM,
Amen!
Evil rules,
Witness of the severing I,
Selfhood's guilt by others owed,
In daily bread now felt,
In which heaven's will be not done,
For man deserted your kingdom,
And forgot your names,
You fathers in the heavens.

I cannot
otherwise translate these words which Jesus of Nazareth
heard from the transformed voice of Bath Kol. [See Note 4] Not otherwise!
It was what the soul of Jesus of Nazareth brought back when
he awoke again. And when he looked for the crowd of
troubled and burdened people who had carried him to the
altar, they had fled. And when he directed his clairvoyant
gaze to the distance he could only see a horde of demonic
beings united with those people.

That
was the second meaningful event, the second meaningful
climax of the various periods which Jesus of Nazareth lived
through since his twelfth year. No, my dear friends, the
events which made the strongest impression on the maturing
Jesus of Nazareth were not of the pleasant kind which could
have a happy effect on his soul. He had to encounter the
depths of human nature before the baptism in the Jordan
took place.

Jesus
of Nazareth returned home from his travels. It was
when his father, who had remained at home, died –
when Jesus was about twenty-four years old. When Jesus came
home his soul contained the powerful impression of the
demonic forces which deeply influenced the pagan religions.
But it is the case that one only reaches certain stages of
higher knowledge by encountering the depths of life, and it
was also so for Jesus of Nazareth that he – in a
place that I don't know – when he was around
twenty-four years old, saw so deeply into human souls, in
souls in which were concentrated all the human sorrows of
that time; he had also delved deeply into wisdom, which is
like a red hot iron penetrating the soul. But it makes the
soul so clairvoyant that it can see into the spiritual
reaches of space. Thus was the relatively young soul of
Jesus equipped with a calm, vivid ability to read the
spirit. Jesus of Nazareth had become a person who could
look more deeply into the secrets of life than any other
earthly being, because no one previously had been able to
observe how profound human misery can be. He had seen
concentrated misery – how through religious
ceremonies one can conjure all the demonic powers. Surely
no other person on the earth had so deeply observed this
human misery as Jesus of Nazareth had, none had such an
infinitely deep feeling in his soul as he had when he saw
those people possessed by demons. Surely no other was so
prepared for the question: How, how can the spreading of
this misery be prevented?

Thus
Jesus of Nazareth became an initiate not only through
the ability to see, and through wisdom, but also through
life itself. That became known to people who at that time
had come together in a certain order, which is known the
world over as the Essene Order. The Essenes were people who
cultivated a kind of secret rite and teachings at certain
places in Palestine. It was a strict order. Whoever wanted
to enter it had to first pass through a strict probation
year, mostly longer. He had to show by his conduct, his
culture, by his dedication to the highest spiritual powers,
by his sense of justice and human equality, by his
disregard for earthly possessions and so forth, that he was
worthy to be initiated. Then there were various degrees
which one passed through to reach a life determined by
separation from normal humanity in a strict monastic
discipline and by certain purification exercises through
which all that was physically and spiritually unworthy was
meant to be eliminated in order to approach the spiritual
world. This was expressed in various symbolic laws of the
Essene Order. Deciphering the Akasha Record shows that the
word Essene derives from, or is at least related to the
Hebrew word “essin” or “assin”,
which means “shovel” or “trowel”,
because the Essenes always carried a small trowel as an
insignia, something that in many of today's orders
has been retained. The Essenes' objectives were also
expressed in certain symbolic practices – that they
never carried coins, that they could not pass through gates
which had been painted or were even close to graven images.
As the Essene Order at that time enjoyed a certain degree
of recognition, unpainted gates were made in Jerusalem so
they could enter the city. If an Essene came to a painted
gate he would have to turn back. The Order possessed
ancient manuscripts and traditions, about whose contents
the members were obliged to maintain strict silence. They
could teach, but only what they had learned in the Order.
All who entered the Order had to give all their possessions
to the Order. The number of Essenes was four to five
thousand. People came from all over the known world and
observed the strict rules. Even if it was far away, in Asia
Minor, or even farther, all property, a house for example,
had to be given to the Order. So the Order possessed small
properties from many places – houses, gardens, acres
of land. None was admitted to membership who did not
contribute everything he owned to the Essene community.
Everything belonged to all, there was no personal
ownership. A very strict rule for our present day mentality
– but what was understandable was that the Essene
could care for the needy with the goods belonging to the
Order, except those who belonged to his own family.

There was an
Essene community in Nazareth, made possible by a donation,
so the Order was known to Jesus. At the Order's
center they were aware of the wisdom which Jesus'
soul possessed – especially among the most important
members. They had what we can call a prophetic view that a
Messiah must come to the world. Therefore they were on the
lookout for especially gifted people. They were deeply
impressed when they learned about Jesus of Nazareth. It is
no surprise, then, that they accepted Jesus of Nazareth in
their community – not as a member of the Order proper
– more as a guest, without him having to pass the
trials of the lower degrees. And the wisest Essenes were,
in a certain sense trusting, open-hearted towards this wise
young man in respect to their secrets. In fact Jesus of
Nazareth heard more profound things about the secrets which
were kept in that Order than from the scribes and scholars.
He also heard much that he had previously learned through
Bath Kol as an enlightenment which shone in his soul. In
short, a lively exchange of ideas took place between Jesus
of Nazareth and the Essenes. And Jesus of Nazareth learned
almost everything that the Essenes were able to give during
his 25th, 26th, 27th,
28th years, and beyond. For what was not
communicated to him by words was expressed by all sorts of
clairvoyant impressions. Jesus of Nazareth received
important clairvoyant impressions either within the Essene
community or a short time later at home in Nazareth, where
a more contemplative life was possible; they penetrated his
soul from powers which had come to him and which the
Essenes had no idea, but which were experienced in his
soul.

One of these
experiences, these inner impressions, must be particularly
emphasized, because it can cast light on the whole
spiritual course of human evolution. It was a meaningful
vision manifested by a kind of separation from his body in
which the Buddha appeared to him directly. Yes, the Buddha
appeared to Jesus of Nazareth as a consequence of the
exchange of ideas with the Essenes. One can say that a
spiritual conversation took place between Jesus and Buddha.
We may and must touch upon this meaningful secret of human
evolution today. In this meaningful spiritual conversation
Jesus heard that the Buddha said something like this: "If
my teaching, as it is, is completely fulfilled, then all
men on earth must be like the Essenes. But that cannot be.
That was the error in my teaching. The Essenes can only
progress if they separate themselves from the rest of
humanity; other human souls must be there for them. The
fulfillment of my teaching would mean nothing but Essenes.
But that cannot be." That was a meaningful experience,
which Jesus of Nazareth had through his association with
the Essenes.

Another
experience was that Jesus of Nazareth made the acquaintance
of a slightly younger man who had joined the Essene Order,
but in an entirely different way than Jesus had, but who
nevertheless did not completely become an Essene. He was
John the Baptist, who lived as a lay brother within the
Essene community. He dressed like the Essenes, who used
clothing of camel's hair in winter, but he never
completely exchanged Jewish teaching for Essene teaching.
But the teachings and life of the Essenes made a great
impression on him, so he lived the Essene life as a lay
brother. He was stimulated and inspired and by and by
became the John the Baptist described in the Gospels. Jesus
of Nazareth and John the Baptist conversed often. One day
– I know what it means to simply tell these things,
but nothing can stop me; I also know that these things must
be told – One day when Jesus of Nazareth was talking
with John the Baptist, the physical body of the Baptist
seemed to disappear and Jesus had a vision of Elias. That
was the second meaningful experience in the Essene
community.

But there
were still other experiences. For a long time Jesus of
Nazareth had observed something noteworthy. When he came to
a place where imageless Essene gates were, Jesus of
Nazareth couldn't pass through those gates without
again having a bitter experience. He saw those imageless
gates, but for him there were spiritual figures on the
gates. To him appeared on both sides of those gates what we
have learned to know from many spiritual scientific
explanations under the names Ahriman and Lucifer. And
gradually he became convinced that the Essenes'
aversion to images on the gates had to have something to do
with the attraction of such spiritual beings to them, that
images on the gates were images of Lucifer and Ahriman.
Jesus of Nazareth noticed this often.

When one
experiences such things he doesn't dwell on them
overmuch, for they are too shocking. One also soon feels
that human thoughts are insufficient to understand them.
One considers thoughts incapable of penetrating these
things. But the impressions not only engrave themselves
deeply on the soul, but become a part of the soul's
life. One feels himself united to the part of his soul in
which such experiences have been stored and carries them
through life.

Thus Jesus
of Nazareth carried through life the images of Lucifer and
Ahriman which he had seen on the Essene gates. He also
became aware that a secret existed between those beings and
the Essenes. Since that experience, Jesus and the Essenes
could no longer understand themselves well. For something
lived in Jesus' soul about which he couldn't
speak to the Essenes. What he had seen on the gates always
injected itself into the conversations.

One day
after an important conversation in which many sublime
spiritual themes were discussed, as Jesus of Nazareth was
leaving through the gates of the Essenes' main building he
encountered the figures who he knew were Lucifer and
Ahriman. He saw them fleeing from the gates of the Essene
monastery ... and a question entered his soul, not as
though he asked it himself, but a strong elemental force
instilled in his soul the question: Where are Lucifer and
Ahriman fleeing to? For he knew that the sanctity of the
Essene monastery had caused them to flee. But the question
remained: Where to?

The question
burned like fire in his soul and he lived with it
continuously during the following weeks. After that
spiritual conversation when he left through the gates of
the Essenes' main building, the question burned in
his soul: Where did Lucifer and Ahriman flee to?

What he did
under the influence of this question in his soul and having
fallen on the pagan altar and heard Bath Kol's
changed voice, and what it means – we'll speak
of all that tomorrow.

[Note 1] —
These lectures were given to members of the
Anthroposophical Society, who were familiar with
Steiner's previous lectures and writings about the
two Jesus children. Essentially, he maintained that the
Gospels of Luke and of Matthew relate the birth and
infancy of two different Jesus children, one descendent
from the royal Jewish line – the Matthew Jesus; and
the other descended from the priestly line – the
Luke Jesus. (See the differing genealogies in these
Gospels.) When they were 12 years old the Matthew Jesus
died, but his “I” incorporated into the body
of the other Jesus. See: From
Jesus to Christ

[Note 2] — Bath Kol
bath'-kol, bath kol (bath qol, "the daughter of the
voice"): Originally signifying no more than "sound,"
"tone," "call" (e.g. water in pouring gives forth a
"sound," bath qol, while oil does not), sometimes also
"echo." The expression acquired among the rabbis a
special use, signifying the Divine voice, audible to man
and unaccompanied by a visible Divine manifestation. Thus
conceived, bath qol is to be distinguished from God's
speaking to Moses and the prophets; for at Sinai the
voice of God was part of a larger theophany, while for
the prophets it was the resultant inward demonstration of
the Divine will, by whatever means effected, given to
them to declare (see VOICE). It is further to be
distinguished from all natural sounds and voices, even
where these were interpreted as conveying Divine
instruction. The conception appears for the first time in
Daniel 4:28)
(English Versions 31) — it is in the
Aramaic portion — where, however, qal = qol,
"voice" stands without berath = bath, "daughter": "A
voice fell from heaven." Josephus (Ant., XIII, x, 3)
relates that John Hyrcanus (135–104 BC) heard a voice while offering a burnt
sacrifice in the temple, which Josephus expressly
interprets as the voice of God (compare Babylonian SoTah
33a and Jerusalem SoTah 24b, where it is called bath
qol). In the New Testament mention of "a voice from
heaven" occurs in the following passages:
Matt. 3:17;
Mark 1:11;
Luke 3:22
(at the baptism of Jesus);
Matt. 17:5;
Mark 9:7;
Luke 9:35
(at His transfiguration);
John 12:28
(shortly before His passion);
Acts 9:4;
22:7;
26:14;
(conversion of Paul), and
10:13,15;
(instruction of Peter concerning clean and unclean).
In the period of the Tannaim (circa
100 BC–200 AD)
the term bath qol was in very frequent use
and was understood to signify not the direct voice of
God, which was held to be super-sensible, but the echo of
the voice (the bath being somewhat arbitrarily taken to
express the distinction). The rabbis held that bath qol
had been an occasional means of Divine communication
throughout the whole history of Israel and that since the
cessation of the prophetic gift it was the sole means of
Divine revelation. It is noteworthy that the rabbinical
conception of bath qol sprang up in the period of the
decline of Old Testament prophecy and flourished in the
period of extreme traditionalism. Where the gift of
prophecy was clearly lacking — perhaps even because
of this lack — there grew up an inordinate desire
for special Divine manifestations. Often a voice from
heaven was looked for to clear up matters of doubt and
even to decide between conflicting interpretations of the
law. So strong had this tendency become that Rabbi Joshua
(circa 100 AD) felt it to be necessary
to oppose it and
to insist upon the supremacy and the sufficiency of the
written law. It is clear that we have here to do with a
conception of the nature and means of Divine revelation
that is distinctly inferior to the Biblical view. For
even in the Biblical passages where mention is made of
the voice from heaven, all that is really essential to
the revelation is already present, at least in principle,
without the audible voice.